An animal shelter in conjunction with animal control laws serves a primary purpose
to protect people, particularly our children.The following
two stories encourage citizens to look at an animal shelter as a service to the
community and not solely to shelter
dogs and cats.Lana and Lew Crow’s
family have come face to face with the deadly rabies virus which is the most dangerous
zoononic (animal to human) disease known to man. Acting
out of kindness, they rescued a seemingly healthy puppy out of a ditch, only to
learn later it was infected with rabies. The
rabies virus is so deadly that once symptoms are present, a horrific death soon
follows since no cure is available.
All who came in contact with this puppy had to undergo preventive rabies inoculations—a
painful and expensive procedure.Included
were their daughter who was pregnant at the time and their two year old granddaughter.This incident resulted because of the
irresponsible behavior of a person dumping a puppy in a rural area—because limited
alternatives exist in our county without an animal shelter. With this in mind, Lana Crow, Vice President Board Member of Paw
Pals and Adoption Chairperson, said, “The reason I work so hard towards our goal
to build a county animal shelter is not only to provide homes for our unwanted dogs
and cats but to help safeguard the families of our county so they will not have
to go through what I and my family had to endure.”Hill County continues to be labeled
a rabies quarantine county by the Texas
Department of Health because the rabies virus is ever present.

In a more recent incident, a lady outside of Hillsboro
was attacked by a vicious “abandoned” stray dog.The dog leaped to attack her face.
Fortunately, she raised her arms and was bitten only on the upper arm.Because of the feral nature of the dog, it could not be captured.She had to wait 10 days for the rabies incubation period before knowing if
she was safe from rabies.Had the dog
been a larger breed, more serious injury or even tragedy would have occurred (recall
Lillian Stiles, a 76 year old lady, who was pulled from her riding lawn mower and
skinned alive to her death by a pack of stray dogs).In fact, Hill County nearly had a tragedy early this year when a young man
escaped with his life from a pack of attacking stray dogs by climbing a tree.

Hill County has all the ingredients for a watershed
event to occur because of its existing and worsening pet overpopulation issue.Does it really make sense not to have proactive
animal control in an environment of pet overpopulation?For those who do not support the establishment
of an animal shelter or think its sole purpose is simply to harbor unwanted dogs
and cats, please reexamine your view—for the sake of our children.An animal shelter is needed
so our law enforcement can fully support existing State of Texas animal control
laws (there are ten State of Texas animal control laws which can be viewed on our
website www.hcpawpals.org).An animal
shelter is needed to provide alternatives for people to surrender their pets and
not abandon them.

Think about animal control laws in general—rabies control,
abandonment, dangerous dog, anti-tethering—all of which primarily protect people.Our county, because it offers no animal
shelter, will continue to see its pet overpopulation issue worsen.Did you know that statistically half of all children, by the time they are
12 years old, will have been bitten by a dog?For those who do not support an animal shelter, please think again.For more information about Hill County Paw Pals please visit our weblog:
www.helphillcountyanimals.com; or call (254)
580-0679.